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Claudia was grateful her son was friends with Steve, although she was a little confused at the beginning.
It’s an odd little arrangement, she’ll concede. One that she almost hesitated to bring up at book club because of a soft, unspoken reminder that Steve and her son made a bit of an odd pair. It was a light graze against an old bruise that’s older than her baby by a few years, one that brings back memories of not quite fitting in with the other girls during high school. She’d hoped that Dusty would get an easier time of it. And- she supposed, he seemingly had.
In some ways, that was. It was possible that she was so overwhelmingly grateful for the fact that he’d been able to make friends in Hawkins that she hadn’t put enough thought into anything beyond that. But- no, it can’t be that, it’s just… well, she knew something was wrong with her kid. He’s her son. Any mother worth her salt should notice when their child is having problems sleeping, shutting down at weird times, arriving home sometimes covered in bruises- always while some other townwide crisis is happening. It took two times for her to switch from: “on top of everything else!” to “this must somehow be related”.
The oddest thing about all of these symptoms was the way that Steve Harrington seemed to fit in somehow.
She’d had questions when Dustin started telling her he was visiting Steve Harrington; only a day or two after Will recovered from the flu at that. According to Dustin, he had been picking up Mike as a favor to Nancy when a high school student named Billy tried to attack Lucas for spending time with his sister.
Well. Claudia had spent plenty of time with Sue over tea, and the Sinclairs were good people. The Hargroves had not come to a single parent group since arriving in Hawkins, so all she had to go off of was a short interaction with Mr. Hargrove in Melvalds, and she gathered enough to not be surprised at what Dustin told her.
Claudia had been pleasantly surprised to hear that Steve stepped up. She was fond of Lorelai, really, after knowing her since high school. Danny on the other hand always reminded her a bit too much of Walter. And while Lorelai had charm to spare, there always had been an airy cadence to her speech, an almost spaced look in her eyes that Claudia recognized from the months after her divorce. If she were a braver woman she would’ve told her to consider taking Steve and half Danny’s assets.
But based on the stories that floated back during book club it seemed like Steve was mostly left to his own devices. Sweet enough boy, to be sure, but the neighbors reported parties, drinking, a whole lot that Claudia was happy to know that her baby would have enough sense to avoid.
So, sure, sue her if she was a mite concerned when she heard that Dusty was going over to the Harrington household, even after Steve had shown some responsibility. She knew what kind of things went on in that house.
He reassured her though that it was only because Steve had a concussion. As a nurse, Claudia could appreciate his instinct to check up on a friend. As a former teenager she could understand his inclination to get to know the popular crowd, especially with high school approaching. As a mother she could understand his overeagerness to get in the good graces of an older boy. As a mother she understood she might not always give him everything that she needed.
Well, maybe she had been getting ahead of herself. Dustin had certainly proven to be responsible before, and it seemed that maybe he was having a stronger effect on Steve than Steve was on him, because his demeanor remained somewhat unchanged. If not improved. When Steve picked Dustin up for something, she could see the way her baby’s eyes lit up. When Steve eventually started coming to the door to knock, instead of idling out in the driveway, she would fix him under a careful eye, and he’d respond with the appropriate shy politeness she’d expect of a young man when face to face with a mother.
She had decided eventually that there was most likely nothing to worry about.
Steve came over for dinner once or twice, and although she could tell he was unsure, Dustin hung off of him like a puppy, and it made her feel warm to see her son so happy after all of the ordeal with Will the past two years.
The thing was, the strangeness around what was going on with Dustin just always seemed to come back to Steve.
The mall fire, over the summer. She knew Dustin wasn’t there. He told her he’d been at the fairgrounds, and he rushed over there when he saw the fire.
It disconcerted her to see how easily he was able to lie to her. Because the thing was, Claudia was able to recognize when things didn’t quite add up. Every one of Dustin’s friends were getting checked out by paramedics when she arrived to pick him up. Joyce Byers had been there, for heavens sake. The report came out later that some of them had even been inside, trying to rescue other people, which was too horrific for her to think about, considering how many of them were children.
Steve was among them. He ended up coming home with them. She understood, at least, why he might’ve been there. Dustin told her all about the fact that he was applying for a job in the little ice cream shop. He was still in his uniform, if her memory serves- only he was covered in blood, allegedly his own. Which lined up with the swollen black eye and bruised ribs.
Claudia was a pediatric nurse. She saw worst case scenarios more frequently than she’d like to admit. She knew how to recognize inflicted injuries, and- thank the Lord- the Harringtons were out of town and couldn’t have done something like that. Still, never for a moment did she believe that those injuries could’ve been caused by a falling beam. If Steve had told her there was a combative rescuee, well, sure, she could hear him out on that, but it occurred to her that he seemed as clean-conscienced about lying straight to her face as Dusty did. The two of them maintained their story. Falling beam.
If he weren’t suffering from a grade 3 concussion she would’ve held him at arms length for a little while. Bond or no bond she did not need her child getting wrapped up in anything dangerous. Fortunately, though, his presence in her house gave her the time and presence to witness an incredibly strange phenomenon.
When Dustin had a nightmare two nights after Starcourt mall burned down, he went to Steve instead of her.
Claudia wasn’t sure whether or not she was allowed to be offended. Her overwhelming concern, of course, was Dustin. In the days after the mall fire he started worrying her six ways to Sunday. To the point that she began earnestly considering trying to find a psychiatrist to help him. Only, with what cause? She wasn’t sure if there was even a reason she could present to Dusty to convince him to go, stubborn as he was. And even once Steve left, she could hear Dustin talk to him late at night over the walkie talkie.
Her baby was hiding something from her. Something that scared him too much to tell her, maybe something he thought was dangerous. Something that he felt okay talking to Steve Harrington about.
But every time for the next few weeks that Steve came over Claudia kicked herself for thinking of trying to press him for information. Steve was genuinely a sweet boy. She trusted her instinct and instinct told her that much. If there were dishes to be done, or somewhere Dustin needed to be driven, he was first to volunteer. A few times he even stayed over when Claudia was working night shifts so he could drive Dustin to school.
Against her will, Claudia was charmed.
She started questioning her own memory. Sure, Steve was at the mall, but he worked there. And Dustin had been having nightmares for years now. He was a sensitive kid. Being a pediatric nurse, Claudia saw more than her fair share of cases that sported hovering parents and estranged teenagers. She just never thought that would be them. Dusty was always so understanding and mature. They used to be so close.
The school year all but flew by, and then… well. Then came spring break. And there was nothing logical to explain what happened.
The ground opened up in front of her very eyes. In front of Karen’s eyes. And Sue’s, and Margret’s, and Jolene’s- and snow fell from the sky in the middle of March.
Things like that just weren’t natural. They were- unnatural. She couldn’t find it in her to voice anything stronger because with the sudden quarantine, they were all stuck there. The sudden darkness that crept in over Hawkins seemed- there were things she couldn’t think, not if it meant keeping her head down and living a normal life.
It seemed hellish.
Steve brought her son back to her less than two hours later. It only took one look. That’s when she decided she wasn’t going to let them keep lying to her anymore. Because her baby and his best friend were decked out in battle gear. They looked like soldiers. They kept looking like soldiers after they were showered and wearing pajamas.
Claudia set up the guest room for Steve because she couldn’t fathom sending him home on a night like tonight. She gave him a set of Walter’s old pajamas- shorts and a soft shirt that she kept in case she ever got a chance to return them. Steve waited until Dusty was asleep in his room before finding her in the kitchen, exhausted and unsure after heavens knew what, and asking her to help him change the bandages wrapped around his torso.
Claudia was a pediatric nurse. She’d seen dog bites before. Cat scratches, one time a bruised set of ribs after a five year old fell off a horse. Animal bites were not uncommon. No animal did this. And certainly no animal left road rash like the kind she found on Steve’s back. Neither could one somehow inflict the damage without drawing attention, which left her with questions about why Steve seemed surprised to hear her bring it up.
By the time she was done it was only a few hours before her alarm went off. She doubted she was going to make it to her shift the next day though. If the world didn’t end last night, it certainly was put on pause.
Steve was nearly asleep sitting up from what appeared to be, pardon her language, one hell of an adrenaline crash. It would’ve been a good time to ask him what had happened. He never let his guard down around her like this. Until now, if asked, she wouldn’t have guessed there was anything to guard. Not in the way he seemed to be guarded.
But Lorelai wasn’t the one patching Steve up, because she was out of town once again, instead of choosing to take Steve and half Danny’s money, like she’d done with Walter years ago. And so, like it or not, Claudia had somehow found herself responsible for him. She was the one to notice that there was anything going on at all, not that she prided herself on her observational skills.
And so whatever was happening with Dustin she knew she would not be able to find it in herself to push Steve on this.
Instead, she had gently shaken him awake, given him pain medicine, and a soft kiss on the head before sending him off to the guest room, already with his eyes closing. (His hair was just barely damp, and the way it curled around his ears reminded her all too much of Dustin’s).
For almost the next year and a half she saw Steve less and less. It started to feel like she saw her own baby less and less too, and she couldn’t help but link the two. She knew Dustin had lost a friend, although Eddie remained a delicate topic in their house for months. Eddie, it seemed, had been everything she was afraid of Steve being. A drug dealer, a criminal, a murderer, and… well, a cult leader.
Claudia had no way to deal with any of it. She spent more than a few nights up late in their living room with Tews trying to rationalize whatever had happened to her son. What had happened to his friends. The boys- the “party” still came over every once and a while. More often than not they were there because Dustin wasn’t answering his walkie talkie.
Steve came by too, especially in the weeks following the “earthquake”. But Dustin was pushing people away, including her.
Well, sue her if she tried to bring in backup. She invited Steve over for dinner.
It ended with a hissed argument in Dustin’s bedroom that she barely pretended not to eavesdrop on, and both of her boys nearly in tears. Steve left before she could pull out the peanut butter cookies she’d made with him in mind.
Dusty was pulling away, and she was getting desperate- and then suddenly something seemed to flip. It was like someone lit a fire under his butt, because out of nowhere he was spending evenings out with his friends again. Barely spent more than a few nights at home, although when he did, they were locked in his room. He still hid things from her, and she could tell, because she knew how to tell when he faked his smiles.
It seemed that her baby had no issues lying to her, and she couldn’t even remember when that had started.
He started coming home with bruises. Excuses about falling off his bike, and tripping into lampposts. Stories low hanging signs in the school hallways.
Claudia was a pediatric nurse. She could recognize the outline of a fist on Dustin’s ribcage, and she told him as much. A few times he broke down and admitted that he was being bullied. It was like a hard press on an old bruise that reminded her their family was never meant to take the easy path. Only, this was unfamiliar territory for her.
Then, less than a week into November, a flip switched.
Steve showed up by Dustin’s side after several days of them both being missing. The two of them covered in bruises, exhausted, decked out once more in battle garb.
They were on her front porch, and Dustin was crying. What else was she supposed to do? She pulled them both in, hugged them tightly, even though they smelled like death. She ignored the way Steve stiffened before relaxing into her hold. He was basically one of hers, at that point. Oddness be- pardon- damned.
The thing was, there were things Claudia knew to be true about the world. The sun rises and falls every 24 hours, sometimes kids grow up too quickly, sometimes the people in charge make bad decisions, but things like natural disasters happen, and everything has a rational explanation. Nothing was truly unexplainable.
Except for the look in her baby’s eyes. Because Claudia was no stranger to the fact that the world could be a cruel place. Even within the relative safety of Hawkins. But there was a difference between cruelty and danger, and it hit her with full force for what feels like the first real time that Hawkins was a dangerous place.
Like any good mother, she set aside the shock and horror she feels and got her boys cleaned up and into pajamas like she did over a year ago. Dustin fell asleep on the couch. It felt so achingly similar to the way it felt then- especially when Dustin was asleep, and Steve was halfway there at her kitchen table, that Claudia couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed.
For the first time she found the courage to really put out into the open that she’d noticed something was going on.
She sat down in front of Steve, shook him awake, and when he’d blinked blearily at her, she’d said:
“Steve, honey. I think tomorrow is about time you and Dusty let me know what’s going on.” He looked unsurprised, and nodded slowly. For a moment she had a flash of panic at the guilty expression that passed over his face. Then, she swallowed her pride, reached forward to push back the damp, softly curling hair away from his face the way she did for Dustin, and tried to pull up the smile she used on younger children when she was giving them bad news. “I need… I need to know how to keep you both safe, sweetheart. I’m a mama. It’s my job. I’m not going to keep pretending I don’t see that there’s something going on.”
Steve nodded again wordlessly. It was probably the toll that the night had taken- one that she didn’t even know the full extent of- but tears began to form in the corners of his eyes.
Claudia understood then that however Steve Harrington fit into all of this he wasn’t to blame.
“Oh… dear. It’s alright, Stevie.”
She pulled him forward, planted a soft kiss on his forehead, and guided his forehead to her shoulder. He might be taller than her by a good bit, but she was no stranger to hugging. Claudia was a pediatric nurse, after all. And a mom.
And- fondness for Lorelai set aside, she might have to borrow her son for a little while. She wasn’t the one letting Steve sob into her shoulder right then, that was Claudia.
It wouldn’t be hard to make room for one more.